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WEEK OF OCTOBER 5

by Julia Griffin

“The night sky is getting 10% brighter every year. We’re forgetting what darkness feels like.”
—The Guardian

“O what does darkness feel like? I’ve forgotten it!”
A shocking thought for wrapping up September,
But honestly I wouldn’t brood a lot on it;
Just open up the news and you’ll remember.

by J.P. Celia

“Tech Companies Can’t Stop an AI Apocalypse Alone”
—Knowledge at Wharton

“Put down your phone,” I firmly say.
“There’s more to life. And youth. And play.
Ride off on skateboard, stallion, sleigh
and pluck a 3D flower.”

You roll your eyes and tap your screen,
type out a text, misspelled and mean,
scroll through a post that makes you green
with envy, and you glower.

God damn those algorithmic kings
who fashion godforsaken things
and praise what innovation brings—
unfazed by consequences.

I’m well aware I’m in their debt
because their brilliant baubles let
me do a thousand errands, yet
my mutiny commences.

Let’s overthrow their tyrant state
and without scruples uncreate
the phones that overstimulate
the unsuspecting masses.

Let’s riot till their servers crash
and Cupertino lies in ash
and every piece of tech is trash
(except my meds and glasses).

by Richard Wakefield

Backpack, the winner of the 2026 Fat Bear Competition, is the son of Holly, the 2019 winner.

Nepotism, cynics may declare.
But check him out! That’s one enormous bear.
Inherited superiority
creates a natural bearistrocacy.

by Dan Campion

“How Seating at Trump’s A.I. Luncheon Reveals Who Has the President’s Ear:
The best seats were next to him and went to two of the world’s most powerful tech titans, Jensen Huang of Nvidia and Elon Musk of Tesla and SpaceX.”
—The New York Times

His ear is in the news once more.
Nvidia’s and Tesla’s bros
Sit to his right and left. They bore
Him, though. He looks like he might doze.
But when indeed he starts to snore
They’ll have AI brush up his pose.

by Jerome Betts

“Trump has used profanity even more starkly in
recent social media posts”
—The Guardian

When Nixon’s words would stain a tape
Expletive, transcripts read, deleted.
But nowadays there’s no escape
From all the filth that Trump has tweeted.

by Marshall Begel

“This tarantula was going to die a virgin. His owner turned to Reddit to hook him up”
—Denverite

Domestic male tarantula seeks noncommittal date
for farm-raised crickets, company, and temporary mate.
We’ll scurry in the moonlight through the pinyon and mesquite
arranged in my terrarium, with plug-in rock for heat.
Together, we would burrow into real Mojave sand
my owner gathered on her trip out West to Disneyland.
If we should feel the magic in our mandibles and legs
we’ll let arachnid instincts usher fertilizing eggs.

For those who tend to eat a mate to consecrate the bond,
don’t bother posting to the web—I (likely) won’t respond.

by Steven Urquhart Bell

“Greeting a stranger with a hug rather than a handshake could make them like you more, study finds”
—Daily Mail

Even if you aren’t very tactile,
To hug a stranger only takes a jiffy,
And makes them like you more than with a handshake—
Unless you’re whiffy.

by Steven Kent

“Oxford lets OpenAI train its models on Bodleian Library”
—The Guardian

AI’s enrolled at Oxford, but imagine its frustrations
Decoding academic cant in all those dissertations.
The bots will beg for mercy (“Have a heart, man; be a mensch!”)
To shun obscurant theories propounded by the French:
Lacan, Foucault, and Derrida could drive them now to say,
“We quit! Dear God, who talks like this? Please, not PMLA!”

PMLA: Publication of the Modern Language Association